Pet Shop Corpse Coverup
by Ihsan997
Summary: Don't you just hate it when your friends show up to your house with a dead body they need to hide? I know I do. Well, this story is kind of like that, except in Warcraft. 4 chapters
1. False Escape

Punchau flared his elbows out as he strutted down the irritatingly immaculate street in Dalaran. After spending an hour with Kirin Tor customs outside the portal he'd taken, he was almost considering whether the penalty for drop kicking a sentry would be worth it. They'd harassed him so much for licensing for wild-caught animals that he found himself hating every spotless inch of the city.

At least, that was what he was hating at that moment. A few minutes prior, he'd been hating the other member of the Unseen Path who'd accused him of poaching. And prior to that, he'd been hating the other poachers he'd had to kill for muscling in on his territory with the prized chicks. By the time he walked through the door of the Magical Menagerie, he was almost to the point of issuing drop kicks all around for anyone who looked at him the wrong way.

Fortunately, Dalaran's denizens had changed in the past few years, and he found a relatively warm reception inside the exotic pet shop. Even the staff members who were citizens of the Alliance generally welcomed him knowing the specimens he regularly brought to them. Lio, a worgen woman who worked the cash register, even clapped her hands when she saw the container he was cradling. Her insistence on trying to be friends with Horde citizens to show off how open-minded she was felt patronizing, but the jungle troll tolerated her overdone behavior for the sake of business relations.

"Ooohhh," she whined in a voice so high pitched that he winced, "you did it! Nobody else has brought in hyacinth macaw chicks after promising too. Good job!"

Punchau set the container down on the counter delicately, deftly avoiding her weird attempt to pat him anywhere within the vicinity of his arm. "Yeah, uh...thanks." He tried to find other things to look at as he talked, because Lio had an annoying habit of locking eye contact with anybody she spoke to without blinking.

Naïveté shined in her eyes as she sidestepped to remain near his field of vision. "No wonder - it's so hard to obtain proper licensing to raise hyacinths!" she cooed, more at the chicks than at him.

His eyes widened for a fraction of a second, but he quickly pretended to be staring at an irradiated fel rabbit taking a dump in the corner of its cage. "Sorts hard I guess," he mumbled, hoping she'd find the colorful baby birds more fascinating than anything he could say.

"Uh huh, uh huh, that's good. This is a really good job!"

"Yeah."

"Nobody else was ever able to find live chicks before!"

"You said that."

"So how did you-"

"Hey, great deal! Listen, can you both shut up for a second?"

'Yes, please,' Punchau thought to himself at the sound of a voice he actually didn't mind hearing. Giada, a goblin member of the staff and one of the few who actually understood his work, walked in top of the counter and mercifully broke up their conversation.

"Giada, look at what he brought!" Lio practically whined through her nose. The worgen at least did her job well, and carefully inspected the health of the chicks inside the container.

When Punchau met Giada's eyes, he realized that he wasn't the only one desperate to escape the checkout counter. Her entire face was knitted in tight worry unlike any time he'd seen her before. She tried to hide it, and was doing reasonably well, but the way she almost looked shaken when she stared up at him spoke of drama he couldn't imagine considering that he didn't know her particularly well. He normally would have made an excuse to leave at the first hint of drama, but he and Giada actually respect each other, and so he shut up as she'd asked.

"Lio, our supplier here had trouble cashing our check the last time he worked with us. I need to take him to the back room and explain to him again how bank notes function."

Clinging to them both to the very last minute, Lio practically tore herself in half to keep one hand in the container of baby parrots and the other attempting to pat Giada's head and neck area. "I know how checking works, too! See, it's not money, but it's like a promise-"

"Well, look at the time, we better get this fellow serviced before he blows a gasket!" Giada nearly yelled as she grabbed Punchau by the finger and dragged him toward the back area of the pet shop. One of the gnomish employees snickered at her wording, but the jungle troll ignored it, wondering what exactly had spooked the person who signed his checks so much. "Just calm down sir, I know you're in a hurry!"

"He doesn't look like he's in a hurry," Lio nearly asked, her mind split between trying to care for the chicks and trying to insert herself in every discussion.

"No, I'm kinda in a hurry," he said as the goblin managed to pull his entire weight through the back door. He wondered if she'd seen a ghost back there given her nervousness.


	2. The Problem

Punchau nearly stepped on Giada as she pulled him into the back room of the Magical Menagerie; he wasn't familiar with the establishment's layout, and the back area wasn't designed for people his size. The hall immediately beyond the door was narrow and low, and she literally ran between his legs to close the door after them. With every step she took among the crates of pet food and monkey diapers, the more flustered she became. He began to wonder just what she'd gotten herself into.

"Slow down, Gia," he said, just barely ducking under a surplus bird cage with super sharp edges hanging from the ceiling as he did.

The goblin didn't even turn around as she led him through a maze of crates to another door in the back area. "It's Giada. And this is no time to slow down," she huffed and puffed as she whipped out her keychain and started to fidget with the lock on the door. "Horde up, for real. What you're about to see has to remain secret." She didn't even look at him as she spoke, and when she got the door open, she crept inside as if expecting there to be an alarm in her own place of work.

"Uh..."

"It's clear, just talk real quiet," she whispered. He tried to grab at his toe to pull him in, but he entered on his own accord to avoid the digit being dislocated, given her air of urgency bordering on panic.

More cardboard boxes obscured his view of all but a pink appendage, next to which Giada was standing with one hand covering her mouth. She'd obviously seen what was behind the boxes before, but she looked shocked all over again nonetheless.

Punchau had already guessed that she had a drunk boyfriend or incapacitated coworker hidden back there from the others. What he found instead, however, was a naked human man with dried blood caking the back of his scalp.

"If there's one time I need to call in a favor, it's-"

"I'm outta here."

"What?! No, no no! Punch, please! My life will be over!"

Giada jumped up and literally grabbed on to and hung from his belt just as he turned to leave. Her little legs scrambled and kicked the back of his a few times as she tried to climb up him like a tree, and he at least paused to avoid causing a scene.

"It's Punchau. And come on, you can't be showing me shit like that without warning." He turned around, removed her from his belt, and put her on the floor like a child, though she was so upset already that she didn't react. "I got warrants out for me in Alliance land already."

"So don't wish for the same to happen to me. Come on, I have to live in this city - imagine what could happen to me if people found out!" She faked puppy dog eyes at him, obviously desperate for help. "Come on, my brother and sister can't keep secrets, and Serrah up in the pet grooming department is a carebear. You're the only person I know who does illegal stuff like this as a pastime!"

"I swear, if we being recorded-"

"Sorry, okay! But seriously, help a sister out. Trolls and goblins share a common ancestor!"

"Tha's literally the first time I ever heard that. I don't think most historians would back you up."

This time when Giada pouted, her expression did look sincere. "Punch, I've never been in trouble before. I can't go to jail. I just can't. Who else can I ask?"

Punchau looked down at his business partner who he could kinda sorta call a friend. He didn't know much about her except that she paid him on time, paid in full, and didn't have a reputation at the taverns in Dalaran. For goblin merchants, no reputation generally meant the individual wasn't involved in dirty business; he'd heard enough to figure out their model of word-of-mouth network regulation. His big ears twitched, scanning the sounds in the building to be sure they were alone.

At the minimum, he'd depend on Giada to continue accepting his deliveries without checking for proper licensing. She was the closest thing to a fence he could find in a legitimate businesswoman. Before he even pondered about her wellbeing as a person, he had to consider their arrangement.

"Fine-"

"I'm saved!" she whisper-yelled, accompanied with fist pumps.

"So, what you did anyway? Your BF slipped and fell?"

Disgust marked Giada's features pretty quickly. "Eww, excuse you! Humans have the weirdest skin colors on the whole planet, what kind of taste do you think I have?"

"And why he's naked?"

"Well, his robe got caught on a nail when I was dragging him down here. He's a bit heavier than me in case you hadn't noticed - it was a rough job just to get him down here, and his robe just tore right off."

"And his underwear?"

"Look, I don't have to answer these wild allegations! He hit his head on the edge of the nightstand in my bedroom upstairs, alright?"

Punchau rolled his eyes. If there was another thing he liked about Giada, it was that she was easier to figure out than she realized. "Whatever. Okay look, I can make this go away, but we gonna need a few things. Aside from you understanding that you owe me first and foremost before anyone else who did you a solid."

Her eyes met the floor as she nodded and whistled silently. "Yes, definitely. That goes without saying."

"Alright. So here's what we...need..."

Punchau actually paused second since Giada had already frozen like a catatonic basket case as he was speaking. Her face literally turned a lighter shade of green as she started pointing behind him, and the jungle troll's jaw dropped open even as he started praying that she'd simply seen a cockroach. A part of him didn't even want to turn around to confirm, but the voice essentially forced him to.

"Wha...my head...where...am..."

"Shiiiiiiit..."

Punchau turned around to find the naked human sitting up weakly, rubbing his eyes and staring at Giada. The pink thing squinted his eyes as if it took a moment for the goblin to come into focus, but when those weary eyes shot open like to giant marbles, there was no mystery as to what was about to happen.

The human wriggled his mustache one time before opening his mouth like a screaming bullfrog.

"Aaaaaaaaarrrrrrggggghhh!"

"Aaarrrgggh!" Giada screamed right back.

"Shhh! People gonna hear!"

"Aaaarrrrggghhh!"

"Aaarrrrgggghhh!"

"Aaarrrggghhh!"

"Shhhh!"

"Aaaaarrrggghhh!"

"Aaaaaaaaaaaaarrrrrrrrrrrgggggggghhhhh ack- hurk hurk hickkkkkkkkk..."

Amid all the screaming, Giada freaked out, grabbed Punchau's steel water flask from his belt, and clobbered the human with it. The shot was a perfect blow to the temple, and the naked human's feet actually started to twitch in a sign of system shock.

Aside from the sound of only two bodies breathing, the storage room was absolutely silent. Both of them stared at the mustacheod man for a few seconds until his twitching stopped. He wasn't breathing.

When he was sure that nobody had heard by some miracle, Punchau sighed. "Well...he's dead now."

Then Giada puked in an empty fishbowl.


	3. The Solution

Giada hid behind a trash can just up the road from the Magical Menagerie. There were few people still in the street at midnight, but those few were so evenly dispersed that there hadn't yet been a point where the coast was entirely clear. Never had she realized that sneaking in to the building where she lived on one floor and worked in another would be so tricky.

Her luck came when two pedestrians passed each other in opposite directions in front of the store, granting her an opportunity when the only people in the area would have their back to her. Holding her breath, she dashed out from behind the trash can with her red wagon full of bags, hoping so dearly that she'd oiled the wheels enough to make a silent dash.

The seconds she spent from her hiding spot to the front door to the foyer were the most harrowing of her entire life. Every wrong thing she'd ever done repeated itself in her head as she struggled to get inside the shop before another person walked by, and she collapsed on the floor once the door was locked. It wasn't being seen merely entering her own place of work after hours that she feared - it was the bags of cooking supplies and tablecloths Punchau had insisted she buy.

When he knocked at the door a few minutes later, she nearly jumped. Thankfully the staff always moved the pets to a special room for sleeping except for the fish, so there were no animals for her to trigger like alarms. She unlocked the door to let him in, and found herself absolutely confounded from the very first second.

"Uh...why are you wearing a tuxedo?" she asked as she closed the door behind him.

Not seeming to understand why it was weird, Punchau simply adjusted his bow tie in a mirror after setting a bad of carpentry tools on the floor. "Huh? Well, uh, it's after six," he replied absentmindedly. Once he was finished, he took a quick look at her little red wagon. "So you got everything, right?"

Giada felt movement in her stomach as she pushed the wagon full of supplies over to him. "Everything you asked for. Am I correct in assuming that I don't want to know what exactly is going on tonight?"

A small growl freaked in the back of his throat, and he only looked at her from the corner of his eye. "You getting your life back, that what's going on," he replied a bit indignantly. "Get with the program, Giada."

She just tried not to think about it and closed the curtains over the shop windows. "I'm with it as long as we don't draw attention to the shop." She paced in circles for a few moments until a knock came at the door, causing her to jump. "Please let this be the people you said can help make this all go away."

Punchau beat her to the door and peeked from behind the curtains to see who it was. He cleared his throat and nodded. "This' them. Don't worry, they're real quiet. We let them in?"

Despite her racing heartbeat, Giada nodded her assent. "Yes...let's get this over with." She handed him the key and stood aside, immediately noticing the heavy footsteps of the 'helpers.'

To her shock, more huge and fancifully dressed people entered one by one. An ogre who looked big enough to have his own gravitational pull walked in, ducking to avoid bumping his head on the ceiling. The ogre was also wearing a tuxedo.

"Mr. Stonemaul, so glad you could join us!" Punchau said in a formal accent Giada hadn't heard a Darkspear use before.

Following the boulder dressed like a penguin was a female ogre wearing a dress so sparkling red that it hurt Giada's eyes. Surprisingly, the dress was so well tailored that the ogre woman's bulk was actually accentuated without any awkward bulges. Her high heels looked like they were ready to strike oil under her weight, though.

"Mrs. Stonemaul, thanks for coming! You look positively radiant tonight."

"Oh you."

A sourfaced undead man with a metal jaw entered next. His countenance wasn't simply due to being undead: he legitimately looked unimpressed. He was at least a little more creative and had worn a grey suit and tie.

"Finneas, glad you could make it."

"We'll see about that."

The last 'helper' nearly bumped into Giada from behind, causing both of them to gasp. Instinctively, the goblin moved toward Punchau, startled that one of the odd visitors had snuck up on her so easily.

She spun around to find a blue-skinned Draenei woman wearing a yellow evening gown. The colors looked great, but something was off about the complexion of the visitor's face. It was a paper mask, apparently, and as Giada started out stare into the stranger's eyes, she was taken aback by the sense of recognition.

"Serrah! What on Azeroth are you doing here?"

Red eyes blinked in surprise as if the disguise were actually a good one. Giada's longtime coworker paused for a few seconds, clearing her throat and mustering a clearly fake accent.

"You don't know who I am," the jungle troll said in an overdone Draenei accent.

Giada blinked for a few seconds because she was too stunned by the poor attempt to speak in the beginning. When her coworker tried to follow the others into the back room, Giada tried to block her.

"What the...Serrah, we've worked in the same place for like four years, are you being serious?"

Serrah's eyes widened behind the paper mask, and one of the paper mache horns almost fell off. She remained undaunted, though, and maneuvered around the goblin to escape the conversation.

"Sorry, I don't know who you are," Serrah said in the fake draeneic accent.

Before Giada could intervene, Punchau ushered the masked woman into the back room and started to close the door. "Hey, watch guard, yeah?" he asked her just before she stuck a wedge in the door to keep it open.

"Wait, Punchau, what exactly do you plan on doing back there?"

He'd drawn his fingers over his mouth a few times in a hand signal to be quiet, and the guests had already disappeared down the hall as if they knew where to go. Punchau kicked the wedge out of the door with his special made troll dress shoes and shook his head at her vigorously.

"We save your behind, now watch the door! Maybe this takes only an hour."

He shut the door without giving her a chance to ask more questions, leaving poor Giada to bite her fingernails in the front room for the next hour. She passed the time by peeking through the curtains, hiding under the checkout counter at the sound of any voice from the street outside, and thinking of every wrong thing she'd ever done in life to deserve such luck.


	4. Walk of Shame

Giada watched Punchau saunter in to the bank that day, slumping in her chair and wondering how he could play everything off so well. She kept worrying that every person who looked in her direction for more than two seconds was some kind of a Dalaran spy, though her imaginary reckoning never came. The two of them met at the entrance as planned and without any interference.

She tried not to react when he sat next to her, and she took care to face in a different direction. He played it cool and surreptitiously left a satchel on the service counter near the entrance, though she did try to look busy in her purse to play up to the act.

In a low voice only a big-eared person could here, she vented to him as she dug through her collection of bank notes. "I thought your solution would end my worries...instead I've been paranoid for the whole week since," she whispered.

He didn't even look at her as they murmured. "You get over it."

"Easy for you to say. You don't live here." She found the signed bank note shed routes through the store's account and slipped it into his satchel, quickly closing her purse thereafter. "Maybe you should wait a while before coming around again."

He chuckled deep in his throat, but otherwise continued to watch the street magician outside. "Don't worry, I told you I'm gonna make this go away. Just get back to your life and remember me first if your boss needs any more endangered species. I work without a license."

Her heart rate increasing again, Giada noticed a town crier outside and pretended to suddenly be interested in whatever inane news was being passed around. There were many answers that floated through her mind, but she was too stressed out say anything. She was proud of herself that she didn't look at him or anyone else as she slipped outside.

"Fml," she grumbled.


End file.
